STC-7 Promotes Broader Vision on Sustainable Tourism

godking
03 May 2005 6:00am

Today´s Caribbean has a much wider vision of what its social, economic and environmental problems really are on the road to sustainable development.

Even though the results of the Seventh Conference on Caribbean Sustainable Development (STC-7) can only be seen in the long run, the debates and discussions did help attendants be fully aware of the need to tackle sensitive matters whose solutions brook no further delay.

That was one of the conclusions of the Seventh Annual Caribbean Conference on Sustainable Tourism Development that came to a close this weekend in Tobago, an effort in which tourists, government officials, investors and employers are supposed to have a say.

A delegate from the host country made her point in a pretty accurate fashion. “We must live sustainability if we truly want to pave the way for the establishment of a sustainable tourism zone in the Caribbean.”

This particular stance matches the message put across by Alessandra Vanzella-Khouri, of the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), who also attended the conference in Tobago. “Sustainable development policies only hold water when they are not applied by a few at the expense of many.”

Suffice it to say that marine pollution is labeled today as one of the region´s most pressing problems that is beginning to put the Caribbean Sea in harm´s way and has already caused irreversible damage to a fifth of the area´s coral population.

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